The Asean Festival of the Arts is being held at the Clark Education Ampitheater and the Convento Theater at Nayong Pilipino sa Clark.

It began yesterday and will last till Saturday. It’s a pity not many people from Metro Manila will be exposed to the wonderful feast for the mind and the senses being laid out at the festival. But a lot of the truly devoted art and theater aficionados have gone to Clark.

The AFAs, since the first festival, have been showcasing the creative works of the best artists in Asean. Each Asean country presents one production in any of the different fields of art.

The Philippines is offering the AFA’s international audience a taste of the creative power of some of our most distinguished performance artists.

Among these are various choral groups, dance troupes, rondallas, a team of Aeta police scholars, lantern bearers, kite-flyers, athletes, Kaddang (walking on wooden sticks) tumblers, and a procession of Angono papier-mâché giants.

A special treat is the famous kneeling carabaos from Pulilan, Bulacan. These are trained in dressage and can do movements like majestic horses.

The Filipino performers include the Kontemporaryong Gamelan, the Cardona Youth Musical Ensemble, the Sinurwan, and the Kapampangan Dance Troupe.

Excerpts from the critically acclaimed Baler sa Puso Ko (Baler of my Heart), a zarzuela whose libretto is by Dr. Isagani Cruz and whose music is by Lutgardo Labad, is being restaged. This musical drama displays the rich heritage of Quezon province’s 400-year-old Baler town, scene of one of the high points of heroism and chivalry of both the Spanish forces and the Filipino revolutionaries who had the Spaniards entrapped.

AFA also has film showings, poetry readings and book launchings. Booths showcase the creative folk arts of indigenous Filipinos. They will once more, as in previous AFAs, drive home to our guests from other Asean countries that we share a common heritage that we, as people of Asean, have a duty to ourselves and our ancestors to proclaim in song, dance and poetry to the rest of the world. See photos of the event